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Tyler Merrick thought his timing couldn't have been worse. He launched Project 7 - a company aimed at devoting some of its profits to charity - in the fall of 2008 as the world financial system was unraveling.

He had left a safe job in his family's pet-food business in Texas to start his own company in Orange County, Calif. He had just turned 30, and he was scared.

"Here I am starting a company about giving back when everyone was just trying to hold on," he said. ...